10 million!

Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter has stated that The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild will help Nintendo sell millions of NX consoles "pretty quickly".

Speaking on GamerTag Radio, Pachter gushed about how great the new open-world adventure looks, and that it hints at NX being a console close to the PS4 in terms of raw power:

Zelda looks amazing. Something I missed… I actually did not realise that Zelda was launching on NX when NX launches. That makes me think NX is much more higher powered than I expected, that NX is an iteration probably closer to PS4 than I thought it would be, and it's going to have a big title to support it.

I think probably only Wii U owners will buy Zelda, but I think everybody who buys an NX will absolutely buy it, and I think it will sell them 10 million consoles pretty quickly. Zelda looked great. I mean, it really looks like a good game.

However, Pachter also feels that NX could miss its proposed launch window. Nintendo has stated that it intends to release its new NX console next March, and took the bold step of not showing off the new hardware at this year's E3.

Pachter cites the E3 no-show as evidence that the system is simply not going to be ready in time, and says that the release window for Sony's PlayStation Neo - also absent from E3 - may to slip as well, with a 2017 launch being likely.

Regarding NX, Pachter did admit that if Nintendo shows off the hardware before the end of 2016 - as is expected - then there's a chance that the March 2017 release date could be hit. If not, then a Summer 2017 launch is his prediction.

As ever, this is just one man's prediction, but the fact that Nintendo has been so reluctant to release any details on NX has triggered some speculation that the system isn't quite ready for a public reveal. If that is the case, then it does indeed make a March 2017 release seem somewhat unlikely - consoles are typically locked down quite a long time before they hit the market, and it could be that Nintendo is experiencing some undisclosed issues with production.

What are your thoughts on Pachter's comments? Let us know with a comment.

[source gamerant.com, via www1.play.it, videogamer.com]